Nearly 1 million Palestinians in Gaza face winter without shelter

The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) says only 285,000 displaced Palestinians in Gaza had received essential shelter materials by late November.

This leaves some 945,000 people still in need of assistance.

“We’ve received only a fraction of the aid required to address the shelter crisis,” said Jeroen Quanjer, the council’s shelter chair in Palestine.

“Hundreds of thousands of displaced families are enduring the winter cold and rain without meaningful protection. Israeli authorities’ repeated denial of essential shelter materials prevents us from scaling up our response to build emergency shelters that can withstand Gaza’s winter conditions.”


_{Displaced Palestinians inspect their tents after sea water swept them away in the al-Mawasi area, on the beach near Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, 25 November}

‘It’s only a matter of time before you die in Gaza’

Karin Huster, a volunteer with Doctors Without Borders who worked in Gaza, has shared an account of what she saw during her recent assignment in the Palestinian enclave.

“It’s kind of hard for me not to cry about this,” she wrote. “Because I don’t think I have seen an army that has been so… nonstop in its aggression toward a civilian population—and more specifically, toward children and women who we all know very well have nothing to do with the original aim of the Israeli army, which was to get rid of Hamas.”

The number of women and children at the emergency rooms is “just mind-boggling”, Huster said. “And the number of kids I have seen with amputated arms or legs, or kids who were killed is just mind-boggling.”

She described conditions in Gaza as an “apocalypse” that is man-made and “willingly made”. “None of this destruction was left by chance,” she wrote. “Palestinians in Gaza live on borrowed time. It’s only a matter of time before you die in Gaza.”

The original aim has always been to get rid of the Palestinians.... Hamas was/is a tool for that purpose, previously supported by Netanyahu himself.

‘Injuries I’ve never seen in my life’: Doctors recount Israel’s attack on UN-run school

We’ve been covering an Israeli attack that killed at least 20 people at the UN-run Ahmad Bin Abdul Aziz School in Khan Younis on Sunday. Casualties were taken to the nearby Nasser Hospital.

International doctors from Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) and the International Rescue Committee (IRC) who were there reported that the emergency department was inundated with casualties.

“The emergency department was full of women, children and elderly patients with severe injuries. I lost count of the number of patients that came in with injuries I’ve never seen in my entire career,” said one doctor. “I counted at least 18 victims who died in the emergency department, of these there were 12 children under the age of 12 years old.”

The doctor said their first patient was a three-year-old girl who had the left side of her forehead torn open by shrapnel fragments that had penetrated her skull.

“It’s very clear to me that the children I witnessed yesterday are not members of any militant organisation, these are young children who are trying to escape war by sheltering in a UN school. Yet they were massacred, I’ve got no other way to describe it,” the doctor said.

Trump reiterates Hamas must reach deal before inauguration or face consequences

In his first news conference since his election victory six weeks ago, US President-elect Donald Trump reiterated that Hamas must reach a deal with Israel to release the remaining captives in Gaza before he takes office on January 20, or face the consequences.

Asked what actions would be taken against Hamas if this didn’t happen, Trump said the Palestinian group are going to “have to determine what that means” but “it’s not going to be pleasant”.

Trump made no mention of the more than 45,000 Palestinians killed during Israel’s assault on the besieged enclave since October 2023. On December 2, Trump issued a similar warning to Hamas, threatening that there would be “all hell to pay” if the captives weren’t released by his inauguration.

Biden vows to continue efforts to free Israeli captives

Speaking at his final Hanukkah party at the White House, the outgoing US president pledged to continue working to free the remaining captives held in Gaza until he leaves office.

“I’ve gotten over 100 hostages out. I will not stop until I get every single one of them home,” Biden said to cheers from the crowd.

The US leader, who will step down in January, also reiterated his belief that you don’t have to be Jewish to be a Zionist.

He declared, “I am a Zionist” to another round of applause.

You have killed over 13,000 children and dare to take credit for the one hostage exchange that should not have stopped. I hope to see the day to watch Biden stand trial, but that will likely will never happen. History will remember however.


US senators urge Palestinians be given protected status to stop deportations

A group of Democratic senators have urged the outgoing Biden administration to “promptly designate” the occupied Palestinian territory’s temporary protected status (TPS) to prevent deportations there.

The letter – co-signed by Senators Peter Welch, Tim Kaine, Bernie Sanders, Brian Schatz, Richard Durbin, Chris Van Hollen, Raphael Warnock and Tammy Duckworth – said that TPS “can and should be applied here to protect Palestinians present” in the US.

“Congress established the TPS to allow noncitizens who are unable to return home safely to remain in the United States for a temporary, but extendable, period,” the letter said. “The ongoing conflict in Gaza and the West Bank is precisely the kind of crisis Congress envisioned when crafting TPS,” it added.

On February 14, Biden granted Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) status to Palestine for 18 months, protecting individuals from deportation if they meet certain criteria. But the senators said the DED “may be insufficient in this instance” as it does not “offer the strongest possible protection” from deportation.

Israel won’t allow a return to pre-October 7 reality: Katz

After Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Defence Minister Israel Katz told a senior US official in recent days that Israel does not seek military or civil rule over Gaza, Katz this morning said in a statement:

• Once we defeat Hamas’s military power and ruling power in Gaza, Israel will control security in Gaza with full freedom to act.
• This will be just as in Judea and Samaria [the occupied West Bank].
• We will not allow any terrorist activity against Israeli communities and citizens from Gaza.
• We will not allow a return to the pre-October 7 reality.

He added in a post on X that Israel will not allow any armed group in Gaza to act against its communities and citizens. “We will not allow a return to the reality before October 7,” Israel Katz stressed.

You want to return to a reality that will continue this conflict indefinitely...

Israel setting terms for potential deal as it plans to treat Gaza as West Bank

There’s very little concern at this point in Israel about what the international community says because for almost 15 months now it has not done things that match their uproar about many Israeli actions and statements.

But what Defence Minister Israel Katz has now said is that Israel intends to treat Gaza the way it treats the West Bank. It can go in and out without reservation or hesitation, it can detain any Palestinian it wants, it can target and assassinate any Palestinian it wants, and it can operate freely.

It is using the same policy in southern Lebanon as well. There’s a ceasefire in place, but Israeli targeting in Lebanon has not stopped – and that’s because there’s nothing to stop it.

The Israeli statements are coming in light of all the discussions and leaks we’ve seen in the past few days about a possible ceasefire in Gaza. Katz is now clarifying what Israel will and will not do once an agreement is accomplished.

‘Genocidal Israel is living in the past’

‘Extensive’ Egyptian-Qatari efforts for Gaza ceasefire: Report

Egypt’s state-affiliated Al-Qahera news is reporting that mediators Egypt and Qatar are making “extensive” efforts with all parties to reach a ceasefire in Gaza.

Any deal would be the first pause in fighting since a weeklong ceasefire in November last year, during which Hamas freed about half of the captives held in Gaza and Israel released 240 Palestinians it was holding in its jails.

Since then, all efforts to reach a new truce have foundered.

Smotrich confirms planning more Israeli construction in occupied West Bank

Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich says Israel will work to “strengthen our hold on all parts of our country”.

“We will not allow the Arabs to sever Gush Etzion and Jerusalem, nor will we allow them to establish a Palestinian state that would endanger our existence here,” he wrote in a post on X.

It came in reaction to a report in Israeli media that said he is “preparing the ground” for a second presidency of Donald Trump in the US, pushing for annexation of more Palestinian land and more Israeli construction in the occupied West Bank.

Smotrich is working to create territorial continuity between Jerusalem and illegal Jewish settlements in Gush Etzion in the occupied West Bank to bolster Israeli control.

Knesset considering bill allowing Israelis entry to Gaza: Reports

Israeli media is reporting that the Knesset has presented formally for consideration a bill to again allow Israeli citizens entry into the Gaza Strip as government coalition lawmakers prepare to legalise the construction of more Israeli settlements on Palestinian land.

The legislation, put forward by Likud MP Avichay Boaron, states that “in the summer of 2005, the Israeli government decided to expel all Jewish residents from Gaza and northern West Bank and to withdraw militarily from the area” which led to the so-called “disengagement law”.

“The ban on entry recalls dark periods in the history of the Jewish people,” it said, in reference to the Holocaust.

Now, the bill said, Israelis should once again enjoy “full freedom of presence and movement” in Gaza, and the war must end “with total loss of Islamist control over the land”.

This comes as a group of coalition lawmakers plans a tour of the Gaza border in order to promote the resettlement of Jews in Gaza.

Over 7,000 authors and book workers join ‘historic’ Israel boycott

The largest boycott against Israeli cultural institutions in history has been endorsed by more than 7,000 authors and book workers, according to the Palestine Festival of Literature, an annual event held across the occupied West Bank.

It said the signatories include winners of the Nobel Prize, Booker Prize, Pulitzer Prize and other top international awards, along with editors at each of the Big Five publishing houses and many independent publishers.

Activists throw leaflets at Berlin shopping centre to protest Gaza war

Pro-Palestine activists have thrown leaflets in a shopping centre in the German capital, Berlin, to protest Israel’s war on Gaza.

During their action on Monday, they expressed their rejection of normal Christmas shopping while a “live-streamed genocide” is continuing in the besieged and bombarded territory.

A video published by a German pro-Palestine page on Instagram, verified by Al Jazeera, showed the moment activists threw a large number of leaflets before being asked to stop.

Israel’s new budget provides army resources to continue fighting: Smotrich

The far-right finance minister has welcomed the adoption of the country’s 2025 budget at the Knesset. “[It] meets all the needs of the war on the front and in the rear until victory and pushes the economy and national resilience forward,” he wrote on X.

The budget provides the Israeli army and the defence establishment with “the resources required to continue fighting”, he added. The Knesset narrowly approved the budget on Monday in its first reading with 59 votes in favour and 57 against it, according to the Israeli media.

How Israel’s budget vote revealed divisions in the governing coalition

As we reported earlier, the Knesset approved Israel’s budget bill that supports the country’s war efforts and was celebrated by far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, another far-right senior figure in Netanyahu’s coalition government, was absent during the vote in protest. Ben-Gvir and his ultranationalist Otzma Yehudit party opposed the bill due to budget cuts affecting his ministry, along with his demand to dismiss the attorney general.

Benny Gantz, who quit the government in June, said in a post on X that Ben-Gvir’s absence from the session and his refusal to approve the budget is due to personal goals and calculations with members of the Israeli government.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid said coalition members are “destroying everything, and this country does not belong to them”.

Gideon Saar, who entered the governing coalition in late September after accepting a post as foreign minister, was in favour of the budget.

At least 13,500 Israeli soldiers wounded during the war: Ministry

The Department of Rehabilitation at the Israeli Ministry of Defence says more than 13,500 officers and soldiers were injured during the war, with about 1,500 of them injured twice.

Among the wounded soldiers are 287 with head injuries, 87 of which are serious, and 10 are in wheelchairs, the government department said, according to Hebrew media.

It added that 37 percent of the wounded soldiers suffer from limb injuries, most of them bone injuries.

About 5,200 suffer from mental health reactions, including 3,350 soldiers dealing with anxiety, depression and adjustment difficulties, and 1,300 affected by post-traumatic stress disorder.

Repeated Israeli attacks cause power outage at Kamal Adwan

Earlier, we reported that quadcopter drones had dropped at least 10 bombs on the Kamal Adwan Hospital in recent hours. The Quds News Network now reports that the hospital’s power has been cut off as a result of the repeated attacks.

There are more than 50 injured people still in the besieged facility, according to Al Jazeera Arabic, including patients in intensive care who require oxygen and water.

WHO chief says conditions at Kamal Adwan ‘appalling’, calls ‘for this hell to stop’

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says a team from the World Health Organization and its partners reached Kamal Adwan Hospital two days ago, “amid hostilities and explosions in the vicinity of the hospital during the mission”.

He said Israeli authorities have arbitrarily denied four missions to the facility in the past week, including the re-deployment of an international medical team that had evacuated from the hospital on December 6 due to hostilities.

“Recent attacks have further damaged the oxygen supply, generators, and broken windows and doors of the patients’ rooms,” Tedros wrote. “The conditions in the hospital are simply appalling. We urge for the protection of health care and for this hell to stop! Ceasefire!”

Death toll from Israel’s attack on Gaza City rises



Earlier, we reported that Israeli fighter jets had bombed a residential building in the Daraj neighbourhood, east of Gaza City, killing at least eight people. The death toll has now risen to 10, according to the Quds News Network and al-Manar TV.

The attack targeted the Tabatibi family home, and footage from the aftermath shows fires burning as rescue crews search for survivors amid the rubble.

Eleven-year-old crushed to death while trying to get bread in Gaza

Zeina, an 11-year-old from the Gaza Strip, was crushed and suffocated on November 29 while trying to get bread from a bakery as famine looms over parts of the enclave. “People barged in all at once, and Zeina was in the middle of the crowd,” her mother told Al Jazeera from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

“The girl fell among the people. They stepped on her. They had no mercy on her. There were footprint traces on Zeina.”

Israeli ground forces advance in al-Mawasi in southern Gaza

We have some updates from al-Mawasi which Israeli forces call a “humanitarian” zone.

Just in the past hour, we have heard a crackle of gunfire, which was later revealed to be an advancement by Israeli ground forces under cover from drones that continue to pummel areas filled with civilians.

We saw earlier today how Palestinians were taking cover from the gunfire, as the Israeli military was conducting some sort of operational activity in the area.

Elsewhere, there has been an escalation in Beit Lahiya in the north. We received confirmation from our colleagues in the north that the Israeli army deployed explosive robots in the vicinity of Kamal Adwan Hospital.

There are still lots of residents trapped in Beit Lahiya who have refused to leave due to the narrow options they have but are feeling very unsafe at the same time.

One of the key attacks which took place at midnight was a strike on a residential home that we reported on earlier, which killed at least 10 people.

‘Tanks were invading’: Trapped MSF staff on al-Mawasi attack

We’ve received a statement from Doctors Without Borders (MSF), about the Israeli attack earlier today in al-Mawasi, in southern Gaza.

The group said that amid intense fighting, 12 of its team members and their families were surrounded by bombing and heavy shootings in their homes, while more than 30 others were trapped in the MSF office.

“Tanks were invading the area where we live. It was terrifying. We were lying on the ground in our homes for hours and it seemed like the gunfire was coming directly towards us,” said a trapped MSF staff member.

MSF said it was forced to close its emergency room in the health clinic in the area due to insecurity, leaving people without lifesaving care even as wounded people were arriving for treatment.

Its statement added: “MSF is deeply concerned for the safety of our staff and patients in Gaza and calls all parties to the conflict to protect civilians and all aid workers, and to establish an immediate and permanent ceasefire across the Strip.”

Israeli military says two soldiers killed in southern Gaza

The Israeli military reports two more soldiers have been killed during fighting in the southern Gaza Strip.

It said reservist Major Moshiko Maxim Rozenwald, 35, was a company commander in an engineering battalion of the Nahal Brigade, adding that a second soldier cannot be named at this point.

The army did not say how they were killed. This brings the total number of Israeli soldiers confirmed killed since October 7, 2023 to 817.